I used to love Otto. Three years ago, I'd give it 4 stars (oh, that cranberry, butternut squash and ricotta pizza!). However, when I went this past Tuesday night (9pm), I was tremendously disappointed with the pizza - I struggled to finish it, despite my strong feelings about wasting food.
For myself and my companion, I ordered at least one slice of the following:
"roasted chicken, caramelized pears and cheese" - I was most excited about this pizza, but it was gross. The pear was not caramelized at all - in fact, some pieces didn't feel or taste like they had been cooked prior to baking. It was completely flavorless and dry. The pear itself had no flavor and was grainy/mealy. The chicken was so dry that it crumbed as I ate it - more like "dehydrated" chicken than "roasted" chicken. It also had hardened tips from dryness which cut into my gums. Between the mealy pear, dried chicken, hard (likely from dryness) cheese and completely dehydrated crust, it was difficult to not throw the pieces of this pizza away. Terrible.
"sausage and onion" - probably the second to least dry of all the slices - i think it was saved by the grease from the sausage. otherwise not noteworthy. still cardboard-y.
"apple, bacon & red onion" - i loved this idea. the apple itself was comparitively delicious. however, the outside of the apple was dried out, as was the rest of the slice. they made no effort to keep the pizza fresh. the sad thing was that i bought the slices of this off of an untouched pizza that i watched them bring out from the side room where the oven is, which likely means that this was the freshest pizza they served that hour. aside from the apple, the rest of the pizza was again painfully dry. since the best part of this pizza was the partially dried apple, I would have been better off just buying an apple at the grocery store and slicing it up plain.
"ricotta" - still dry. probably the least dry of all the slices, though.
"cheese" - dry, hard and flavorless. texture of cardboard.
I've never had to consume so much water with a meal just to choke it down. Also, I woke up in the middle of the night incredibly dehydrated. I was unable to eat the crust of a single of the slices of pizza. It was too painful to bite, as it kept scratching my gums and tongue.
Traditionally, the folks at Otto warm the pizza in the oven before handing it to you. The pizza I purchased was barely warmed for a minute before it was handed to me. It was not even lukewarm. I appreciate that they were trying to hurry (not sure why), but it was not crowded and I wasn't in a rush. I would have preferred to have properly warmed slices than not-quite-cold slices.
Slice consistency was poor. I had several slices that were half the size of the other slices I was served. You can't charge the same amount of money for two slices of the same pizza where once slice is half the size of the other slice. That's ridiculous.
What's worse is that this entire experience (9 slices total -- multiples of a couple types) cost a whopping $34. If it was good pizza, I'd be happy to pay that amount. But this was just highway robbery. Both of us were incredibly disappointed. I can no longer recommend Otto. There are far better pizza joints in the Cambridge/Boston area. Otto has let their quality not just slide, but plummet. Their prices have not plummeted to match. They've lost my business. read more